关键词: 预算控制系统, 科研经费支出, 绩效, 核算难度

Abstract: Scientific research units, as well as government administrative departments, acknowledge the importance of budget control to the management of scientific research funds. Scholars have done a lot of research on the impact of budget control system and its factors on the performance of scientific research expenditure in China. Generally speaking, the existing research mainly takes developed countries as benchmarks or makes qualitative analyses of each factor itself according to subjective experience. Although some scholars in the world have earlier empirically explained the importance of budget control in R&D and emphasized the flexibility of funding system constraints, there is still a lack of research on the impact mechanism of integrated budget control system on the performance of scientific research expenditure. The purpose of this paper is to examine whether the status quo of budget control system factors and budget execution can effectively control the performance of scientific research expenditure.In addition to budget control system, accounting is another factor that may likely influence the performance of scientific research expenditure. Scholars generally regard reducing the accounting difficulty and improving the scientificity, rationality and practicability of accounting as the research focus of scientific research funds accounting. However, an exception is a recent study by three Chinese scholars that provides analytical, as well as empirical, evidence that accounting difficulty is not the main factor directly affecting the management of scientific research funds. Then, how does the accounting difficulty affect the performance of scientific research expenditure in China? How heterogeneous is the impact of accounting difficulty on the relationship between budget control system and performance of scientific research expenditure? It is of great theoretical significance to the performance of scientific research expenditure.The relationship between budget control system, accounting difficulty, and performance of scientific research expenditure remains, to date, more or less a black box. Based on the theory of budget control system, this paper constructs a relatively complete impact mechanism model of budget control system, and divides the performance of scientific research expenditure into two levels: the expenditure performance of scientific research personnel and the fund management performance of scientific research units. The research data are collected in the form of questionnaires, in which the items of the questionnaires refer to the prior literature. With the help of Shanghai Science and Technology Commission and Shanghai Maritime University, this paper conducts field research and forecasting tests, and invites experts from Shanghai Jiaotong University, Shanghai Institute of Technology Logistics under Chinese Academy of Sciences and the Office of Audit Office in Shanghai to evaluate the questionnaire. Formal questionnaires are distributed to researchers and research managers of universities and research institutes in Shanghai and Zhejiang. Then, using the OLS regression method, this paper empirically analyzes the impact mechanism of budget control system factors and the moderating effect of accounting difficulty on the performance of scientific research expenditure. Overall, the results find the following conclusions.Firstly, it is not balanced that three factors of budget control system affect two level performance of scientific research expenditure. On the one hand, system design and internal supervision have a significant positive impact on the performance of scientific research expenditure, which shows that the more reasonable the system design and the more active the internal supervision, the more effective the performance of scientific research expenditure can be improved. It is suggested that scientific research units should conscientiously implement the national scientific research policy, strengthen system reform and innovation, explore a budget system that conforms to scientific research laws, project nature and discipline characteristics, and strive to improve the supervision enthusiasm of internal departments in order to form a sound and effective internal supervision system. On the other hand, although the third-party evaluation audit has no significant impact on the fund management performance of scientific research units, it has a significant impact on the expenditure performance of scientific research personnel. For a long time, the third-party evaluation audit institutions are seldom introduced into the management of scientific research funds. The conclusion of this paper confirms that the third-party evaluation audit should not be neglected.Secondly, budget execution has a mediating effect on the relationship between budget control system factors and the performance of scientific research expenditure. Specifically, system design and internal supervision have significantly positive impact on two level performance of scientific research expenditure by mediation of budget execution; the third-party evaluation audit has a positive impact on the expenditure performance of scientific research personnel through mediator of budget execution. It implies that existing budget compilation and implementation is still play an effective role in controlling the performance of scientific research expenditure, which is the core and key of the management of scientific research funds. This paper also confirms that third-party evaluation audit can significantly improve budget execution in the management of scientific research funds. This has important theoretical significance for the research of budget control system.Thirdly, the accounting difficulty negatively moderates the relationship between budget execution and two level performance of scientific research expenditure. Extensive accounting model, especially the lack of scientific, reasonable and practical indirect cost accounting methods, is difficult to provide timely and accurate accounting data, thus weakening the positive impact of budget execution on the performance of scientific research expenditure. The management of scientific research funds is a systematic project, which cannot emphasize the role of one or some factors partially or in isolation. We must systematically understand the mechanism of each factor, take the budget execution as the core, and coordinate the factors of each budget control system with the accounting in order to effectively improve the performance of scientific research expenditure.This study makes several important contributions. First, this paper identifiesthree budget control system factors: system design, internal supervision, third-party evaluation audit and empirically examines their impact on the performance of scientific research expenditure, which expands the previous research literature on budget control system and the management of scientific research funds. Second, to divide the performance of scientific research expenditure into the expenditure performance of scientific research personnel and the fund management performance of scientific research units is helpful to correctly understand the management practice of scientific research funds. Finally, it constructs a more systematic and complete management control effectiveness framework and confirms the mediating effect of budget execution and the moderating effect of accounting difficulty on the performance of scientific research expenditure, which provides strong empirical support and beneficial enlightenment for the policy making of the management of scientific research funds in China.

Key words: budget control system, scientific research funds spending, performance, accounting difficulty